


Manor

by smeeshii



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Blackwood Pines ain't done with you yet, Canon couples, Dubious mythological rules, F/M, Josh Lives, Slow Burn, Wendigo Josh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-04-13
Packaged: 2018-06-01 14:49:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6524542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smeeshii/pseuds/smeeshii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two years in a row Blackwood Mountain has brought a group of kids nothing but tragedy and pain.<br/>Mostly everyone is rescued, but are they truly safe? With an investigation under way, some can't help but wonder if there's something more devious going on in what's supposed to be a safer place when one overhears a conversation between two doctors concerning an eighth survivor. But only seven were picked up... Something suspicious is happening in the Pines, and a part of the group wants to get to the bottom of it.<br/>What can they say? We're all suckers for punishment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I did very mild editing here, whoops.  
> Enjoy!

Josh wasn't sure he'd ever had a migraine so bad in his whole life. His head was absolutely pounding. To boot, his whole body ached too and he was freezing cold.

His eyes scrunched up tight, then opened. It was probably better, he decided, that it was dark wherever he was. For a moment, he lay still and took in what he saw. Not the lodge or his bedroom at home. No, he was in a dark, damp... cave? The rock walls were so tall that he couldn't see the dark ceiling, but he could hear water dropping from above. The cavern he was in was long and one side was sectioned off with a wall of rotting wood. Light from somewhere among the rocks above filtered down in a soft yellow.

He wracked his brain for an answer to where he was. Fuzzy images came to mind, not all fitting together properly.

The vengeful prank he'd pulled, Chris and Ashley tied to chairs. Saw blades, pig blood, a white towel. He could remember Mike and Chris yelling... at him? The view of the trees from the ground, rushing passed him, a low growling sound, screeching.

He scrambled up onto his bottom, back pressing into the wood wall in fear as scabby, pale skin and jagged teeth flashed before his eyes.

"I-It's not... it's not real," he whimpered, eyes wide and straining to see. 

Long corridors ran from the room, deeper into the mines. It was like he was at the intersection of a massive maze. The thing... that monster... it'd taken him here, but where had it gone? He had to hide, find somewhere to take cover in case it came back. Glancing around, the only viable place in sight was a notch in the wall. Crawling towards it, he became all too aware of how banged up he felt.  
The inside of the notch was dark and Josh gagged at the smell inside. The space was enough for one and a half people, the floor covered in a mess of twigs and bone fragments. It smelled like decay and rot, but it was the only place he wouldn't be seen.

Crawling in, he shivered and vomited when one of his hands landed on something moist. He scrubbed his palm on his pants and cowed himself into a corner, trying to calm his rapid breathing and keep the haggard sobs that rocked him quiet. 

\---

For ages, Josh didn't move from his spot. Or at least he thought it was ages. The light coming from somewhere above went from yellow to a dim blue more than once, but the silence in the caves didn't give him any idea of just how long he'd sat there. 

He'd drifted in and out of consciousness, though he never truly slept, just went from being stuck in a panic to zoning out. 

In his haze, his memories had become a little clearer. The prank was pieced together, then walking to the shed, but everything after was just a cluster of fuzzy images. Some real and some not. He was fairly certain that he'd imagined a giant pig's head, but the remains around him made him wonder if the piles of intestines had been real. 

The monster was real though, it'd dragged him here and dropped him on his head. That he knew had happened, judging by the awful crick in his neck and bruising on his head. Whether or not he'd imagined the disfigured butterfly on it's arm, he wasn't sure. 

At least it hadn't come back, not yet. 

\---

It was during one of his moments of feeling blank that he heard it. He'd been staring at the dark wall of rock across from him, eyes blurring over the chipped surface when the sound of caws scrabbling across the cave walls echoed into the cavern.

He wasn't alone. 

The sound carried on, as if whatever was out there was moving around. Josh held his breath, not daring to move a muscle. Was he imagining this too?

A low, trilling growl echoed somewhere close by. Then suddenly a skeletal hand poked into the opening of the notch, blackened claws gripping the rocks. What followed nearly made him scream

A humanoid head peaked into the little nook. It's skin was pasty white and scabby, only thin wisps of hair still clinging to the back of it's skull. It's mouth red with blood and dirt, distended jaws not quite closing thanks to yellowed, jagged teeth. He could smell it's breath, reeking of death and rotting meat. It's sunken eyes darted around, mouth opening to let out a screech that made his ears hurt and ring. 

After another moment of staring into the dark, it huffed and pulled back. He didn't dare move or make a sound until long after the creature had scuttled away.

When he allowed himself to take deep gulps of breath again, he realized he'd pissed himself in fear.

\---

The monster didn't return again, though he sat in terror waiting for the moment it would decide to come back and tear him to tiny pieces. Without a means of tracking time, he felt like he was stuck in limbo, awaiting... well, he wasn’t sure what. 

What he did know, was that somewhere between the times when he was spaced out and when he was certain his body was imploding upon itself, he realized that all the voices had gone as silent as the cave.

All but one.

It's started out as a soft sound, he'd mistaken it for the dripping water from the ceiling or air whistling through the caved at first. Then it grew louder, and louder until he could hear the words it spoke. They weren't English, but somewhere along the line, his brain connected them to the feelings they came with. 

Hungry. He was so hungry.

It was almost like the voice replaced the sound of his stomach growling. It was low, rumbling and made him so painfully aware of just how badly he needed food. For so long he'd been avoiding moving, just barely existing in his little notch in the wall, but now his body was begging him to eat.

After a long battle, he moved onto his knees, crawling towards the entrance. He sure as hell wasn't going to eat anything in the nook, but what was even out in the cavern? Moss maybe?  
No, the voice seemed to coo, or at least that’s how it made him feel. 

The light filtering in was yellowish again, but he could see something glint in it towards the ceiling. 

If he could throw up again, he would have. Hanging from a hook was a familiar, headless body. The missing body part lay on the ground just below it.

Oh god, no. No he couldn't... Could he?

The voice was urging him on, telling him that he needed to survive, he needed to eat. It wasn't wrong... he did need to eat. 

Listening for any other sounds in the cave, he crept across the cave floor to the head. It already stank, the flesh pale and puffy in the cheeks, dead eyes glazed over. Reaching forward, he cringed and gagged when he touched it. He swallowed back bile, body trembling as he poked at the bloody severed bit of neck.

The voice purred, egging him on to eat. 

Breath stuttering, he gripped the skin and tore off a small handful sized chunk. It was gelatinous and wet. Lifting it to his lips, he barely got his teeth into it before he had to stop and heave.   
Again the voice praised him, telling him to swallow it in a louder, more demanding tone.

Taking another breath, he shoved the meat into his mouth, swallowing without chewing. It already tasted like it had gone bad, like off pork. He only managed to keep it down for a few seconds before he vomited it back up, scrambling away from the rotting head and back to the safety of his notch in the wall with a sob. He collapsed against the furthest wall, bones clattering around him. He heaved and cried, head in his hands. 

He wasn't sure when he finally passed out.

\---

Again, Josh had no sense of time. He didn't know how much had passed while he lay in the piles of bones, flitting in and out of consciousness.

What he did have a sense of was that something was very wrong.

His hands and face absolutely throbbed and his one eye was blurry and ached. He'd awoken feeling more exhausted than before, groggy like he had been drugged. When he ran his hands over his face as he sat up, he found that his nails had grown out and his hands looked bonier in the dim light. His knuckles seemed to jut out more against his skin. 

He flinched when his fingertips his something sharp and jagged, pulling back to see blood on them. What was stuck to his face? What cut him?

Slowly this time, his hands rose again to touch the offending object. What he felt was a searing pain and raw skin, the corner of his mouth roughly torn to the middle of his cheek. When his fingers felt beyond the gaping rip in his face, he felt the source of all the pain in his jaw. His teeth had grown long and pointed, some pointing in directions that they really shouldn't have.  
Panic began to rise in his chest and he let out a small whimper of shock and fear. Feeling elsewhere, his other cheek felt hollower and above that the lid of his now blurry eye were dry and scabby. Though he couldn't see it, he felt eyelashes fall from them when he pulled his hand away. 

His breathing began to pick up, but the moment he took in air, he covered his face. He could smell everything so much stronger, he could taste it. The damp mold clinging to the cave walls, the wooden wall, rotting away, piss and... he could smell the decaying body outside his nook.

That scent made him aware of the deep empty feeling in his stomach, the pain it was causing him. The voice reared again, but this time it's words were a mix of the language he couldn't understand and English. It was louder, vibrating inside his skull, like a small crowd was yelling in an echoing room. It was calling him to eat. 

He groaned, trying to speak and tell it that he wouldn't with little avail. His limb felt stiff, moving almost on their own out of the nook. Loping forward like an ape, he made his was towards the head again on all fours. 

Though his mind was trying to scream back no, his body craved food and was determined to eat whether he liked it or not.

Picking up the head with nearly claw like nails, he brought it up to his face again, this time sinking his newly deformed teeth into it's cheek rather than his first attempt of testing it. The taste was no less foul this time, but he gave a moan of need. It was like he'd been starved for weeks and his body was reacting to a feast set before him. Biting at the swollen flesh clumsily, he barely got more than a bit of pulpy meat and blood down. His teeth were malformed in a way that what he tore of slipped through the gaps in his teeth and onto the ground.

He was certain that he'd be licking the mess off the rocks, if not for the sound of voices and flashes of light behind him.

Protect the food, kill the prey, the voice chanted. 

Light shone onto his back and he could just make out voices pointing him out. Something animal flowed through Josh's body and he stood, wheeling around with a feral growl.  
A man screamed and he lunged forward, jaw unhinging far passed normal human motion. He opened his hands, claws finding purchase in something soft. The scent of blood filled his nose and his vision turned red, arms swinging.

Then he felt something searing hot blast across his back, world turning bright orange. Fire, the voice wailed to retreat. Before he could, his sense of smell and taste were overtaken by a pungent, herby burning. He fell to the ground, hissing and spitting, scratching at his face to stop the pain it caused. 

He barely felt tiny poking sensations before his sight faded to black.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Most of the group is picked up at the lodge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't really intend for this to be so Sam-centric. Just sort of happened?

The ground was hard against Sam's face and chest, knocking the wind out of her. He back seared, the explosion behind her burning through her hoodie and the back of one of her pant legs. The thick patio stones, snow blown away from them, scraped her cheek and nose when she hit them. Trying to catch her breath, she felt hands on her shoulders, weakly urging her onto her feet enough to stumble further away from the blaze.

Her back fell against a tree and she cried out in pain, the hands shaking her shoulders. It was only when she opened her eyes fully and saw Mike kneeling in front of her, mouth opening like he was yelling.

Except she couldn't hear anything but ringing and muffled sounds.

She tried to yell back, but even the sound of her own voice was unclear. It looked like he was trying to say something, but she couldn't understand the movements of his lips. Instead of trying to talk back, she pointed weakly to her ears and shook her head. He seemed to catch on and looked like he was swearing.

Emily appeared behind him, looking at her. Slowly, the muffled buzzing was becoming clearer, but Sam still couldn't make out her words. Mike turned to her and shook his head, apparently trying to explain. It was clear that Emily was having none of it by the look on her face and the way the buzzing Sam could make out as her voice rose. She pushed Mike out of the way and took his place, gripping her face firmly. She turned her head this way and that, attempting to see if there was anything wrong that she could locate with her eyes. 

Setting her face straight again, Emily spoke and pointed to Sam, then her own ears, then moved her hand in a rejecting motion. Sam could make out the word “or” before Emily made a hand signal for “a little” and waited.

She was asking if she couldn't hear at all or if she could hear a bit. The ringing was fading and the buzzing coming a little clearer, she could just barely make out voices and draw words to the bare sounds and lip movements. She mimicked the second hand motion and Emily nodded, turning to say something to Mike in what she guessed was a angry tone.

It gave Sam a chance to assess their situation. Mike and Emily were okay, her eyes searched around. A few feel away, Chris was standing and favouring his uninjured leg, leaning over Ashley who was sitting on the ground. From the way she moved and the very faint sobbing she could hear over Emily berating Mike beside her, the girl seemed hysterical. Christ offered his hands, trying to get her to stand. The look on his face said he was attempting to calm her down, but was at a loss. 

Ahead of them, the lodge was becoming a raging fire. She could feel the hear of it on her face and hands, only now realizing just how cold she was. Her hands ran up and down her arms, trying to create some friction as she watched how quickly the lodge was burning up. Even after the horrible experiences of the night, something tugged in her chest. Memories of happier times mingled in with the terrors.

She realized that thought her ears continued to ring, the left even feeling plugged, she could make out what people were saying and the whooshing of helicopter blades up above. She watched as one of two of them rounded back towards the lawn. 

“Come on, we have to go,” Emily was at her side again, hauling her to her feet. Mike appeared at her other side, ready to help if need be.

Chris had managed to get Ashley up and under some control, she was sipped under his arm to help him limp along. Or maybe he was trying to keep her close for comfort, who knew. He frowned and his head whipped around, then swivelling between the burning lodge and Mike and Sam. 

“Wait, where's Josh? Where is he?” 

Sam met Mike's eyes. They had barely had time to think when they'd met at the cabin again before everyone was running back into the common area with wendigos on their heels. Hell, it was barely just registering to her that Mike had indeed said that he'd lost him in the mines. 

“Ch-Chris,” she began, voice cracking.

“I'm... I'm sorry, man. He... in the mines,” Mike tried to finish.

The blond gobbed for a moment, throat making scratchy, unintelligible sound. He looked like he wanted to say something, but nothing was coming out. Even so, his face showed everything he was thinking. Disbelief, heartache, regret. 

“We have to go,” Emily repeated more firmly, urging Sam forward.

A number of rangers piled out of the chopper, swarming them. Medical supplies were doled out, each of them wrapped in shiny thermal blankets. The medics seemed mostly concerned with Mike's missing fingers, were quickly wrapping Emily's shoulder and putting Chris' ankle in a temporary splint. One moved on to her, asking if she had any injuries that needed immediate attention. At first she shook her head, but then hesitated.

“M-My ears. It's hard to hear, they're ringing and this one feels plugged,” she said, gesturing to her left side.

“The blast might have done that, we saw it from the air,” he replied, raising his voice almost obnoxiously. 

It only took moments before the rangers were leading them to the chopper, squeezing them inside. Sam found herself sandwiched between the medic who had spoken to her and Emily. Mike, Chris and Ashley sat across from them with two others. 

Take off and flight was nauseating, mixing with the awful silence inside the helicopter. Chris almost seemed catatonic, Ashley clinging to his side with wide eyes that flickered from one side of the cab to the other. Mike had leaned forward, head wresting in the hand that wasn't currently a mitten of dressings. His focus was on the floor, she had to wonder if it was due to exhaustion currently setting into them or because she vaguely remembered that he hated flying. Emily sat beside her with a stink eye that could melt metal, the three ahead of her baring the brunt of it.

One of the men on the other side of the cab, seeming to be in charge, began to speak as the bottom of the mountain came into view. 

“We're going to get you kids patched up a bit better when we get to the station. As you can understand, this is a serious situation and we need all of you to tell us what happened. Separately of course. Soon as that's over, we'll be taking you to the local hospital for further treatment.”

Something about his tone made her feel uncomfortable. It was almost accusing. Gripping the filmy sheet around her, Sam settled into her seat and focused out the window, drowning out the sound of Emily's temper flaring up as the went back and forth with the man about how interrogations could wait.

The sun was finally rising over the mountain, bathing the landscape in soft yellow and orange light. Below she could see the trees, clearings of white breaking them up. It would have been beautiful, if she weren't so tired and ready to be as far away from the forest as possible. Her eyes felt heavy, though she dared not close them for too long, mind playing tricks on her. She could swear she saw shapes weaving between the trees higher on the slopes, fleshy monsters crawling home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, from what I remember, Sam splits up from Mike and Josh to go back to the lodge, Hannah bronaps Josh and Mike maked it back without him. When he and Sam meet up again, he tells her that Josh is gone, but I can't remember him having the time to tell the others. They go into the basement and the other three run by with two wendigos on their tails, run upstairs and you know the rest. If I'm wrong please let me know!  
> I'm also banking on Sam having some form of hearing damage from the blast, which I'll explain better later on.   
> In my version here, Mike does lose his digits (sorry buddy).   
> Next chapter is going to deal with the interviews hopefully briefly, and getting everyone into the hospital.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so obviously Josh lives here. Fair warning, I've got a lot of research to do on wendigo lore, but a lot in this fic is coming off the top of my head. I'm probably making this shit up as I go, haha.  
> As far as how long Josh is in the mines... a few days? A week? I think we could see a believable transformation in that time, I mean there are three days (I think) in Hannah's notes between her eating Beth and starting to become a wendigo, then illegible writing.  
> I'm HOPING to get right into writing the next chapter soon, but I warn that it probably wont be as long. I mean this one just sort of... happened.  
> If you like this, show me some love! If you want to show me some more love, I'm on tumblr, my user is: neeshiii


End file.
